


Parenting: A Guide By Bruce Wayne

by victoria_p (musesfool)



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU (Comics)
Genre: Batfamily Feels, Ensemble Cast, Gen, Pre-Reboot, the batdad his kids deserve
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-01
Updated: 2015-08-01
Packaged: 2018-04-12 10:11:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4475453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musesfool/pseuds/victoria_p
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three times Bruce was a Batdad to his Batkids.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Parenting: A Guide By Bruce Wayne

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [**this tumblr post**](http://reyesrobbies.tumblr.com/post/123677596508), and slightly edited from what I appended onto it on tumblr. Pre-reboot.

1\. _Damian_

Normally, Bruce would drive himself to the Gotham Arts Society Annual Spring Fundraising Brunch, but he already had the beginnings of a headache at the thought of being groped by Mimsy Carson-Doolittle (and her Bichon Frisé, Mopsy) and the idea of having to mediate between Tim and Damian over who got to ride shotgun on the drive over was untenable. 

"We'll take the Bentley," he said to Alfred as he straightened his tie and adjusted the puff on his pocket square to appropriate puffiness (it wouldn't do to be _too_ exuberant; the pocket square was already an alarming shade of purple, a surprise Christmas gift from Stephanie).

"Very good, sir."

With Alfred in the driver's seat, Bruce sat up front and left the boys to squabble in the back seat. After five minutes of it, he gritted his teeth and pressed play on the iPod that someone had left attached to the dash.

The jangly strains of REM's "Superman" rang out, identifying the iPod as Dick's. Bruce bit back a sigh and resigned himself to it.

Two songs later ("Holding Out for a Hero" and a live version of the Kinks' "(Wish I Could Fly Like) Superman"), Alfred raised an eyebrow and then looked pointedly at the rearview mirror. Bruce turned to discover that Damian and Tim had moved from squabbling to grappling, with Damian grunting out death threats while Tim fended him off.

Bruce turned the music off, glared at the boys, and snapped, "That's enough. Don't make me turn this car around."

Alfred harrumphed softly but didn't correct him.

The threat didn't have its intended effect. Perhaps that was actually the outcome they were aiming for. While Tim was good at public events, he didn't like them more than anyone else in the family, and Damian was...Damian was a work in progress. Dick had done wonders with him, and Talia had instilled manners, but getting the boy to behave in public was exhausting. 

The more Bruce thought about it, the likelier it seemed that a reprieve from eggs Benedict with Mimsy Carson-Doolittle and her ilk was exactly what the boys were aiming for. So he said, "If you don't stop that, I'll make sure you're sitting with Vicki Vale at brunch."

Both boys straightened up. Tim's hair was floppy enough that it was barely mussed by their shenanigans, but Damian's stood on end, laying to waste Alfred's herculean efforts to get it to lie flat. He ran his hands through it in an attempt to fix it, which only made it worse.

"It's fine," Bruce said. "You look very cool."

Damian sucked his teeth and Tim smirked, but when Bruce glanced at them in the rearview again a few minutes later, Damian looked inordinately pleased with himself.

Bruce allowed himself to feel smug for a moment (had he looked in the mirror at that moment, he'd have seen how much Damian resembled him), mostly because he knew it wouldn't last. 

*

2\. _Cass_

There were a million other things Bruce should have been doing: the Batmobile needed a tune-up, the League was asking for funds to upgrade the Watchtower's forensics lab, he needed to track down a potential informant about a kidnapping ring in Tricorner, and he still hadn't returned any of Lois's calls about an exclusive with the Planet.

But for this half hour, none of that mattered. These thirty minutes once a week were sacrosanct. He pulled up in front of the dance studio where Cassandra had her ballet lessons just as she appeared in the doorway.

"Ice cream?" he asked as she got into the car, and her answering smile made him happier than even a hot fudge sundae with extra sprinkles could. (Not that he indulged in such luxuries frequently. But for Cassandra, he found himself making exceptions.)

She pulled on her seatbelt and said, "Today, I would like to try the salted caramel."

"All right then, let's go."

Each time, he told himself he would get the plain frozen yogurt with no toppings, but Cassandra enjoyed tasting new flavors so much that he always gave in and had something new and exciting so she could try it. This week, it was pralines and cream with butterscotch sauce, which was much too sweet for him, so after a few mouthfuls he pushed the bowl in her direction and smiled fondly as she demolished it.

They didn't talk much on these excursions, but neither felt much need to. He asked her about how her dance lessons were going and she asked him how his cases were progressing.

This week, though, she said, "We're having a performance next month. I'll be in the corps. I would like it very much if you came."

"I would be delighted," he answered gravely, before allowing his proud smile to bloom across his face. "I'm sure Alfred and the boys will enjoy it as well." He was certain that doing something nice for Cassandra would trump any current animosities between the boys. At least for the length of the recital. He and Alfred would make sure of it.

"I've invited Steph," she said, and he pretended not to notice the brief hesitation before she said it, though he felt a pang of something like remorse.

"Of course," he said. "It'll be a family affair."

*

3\. _Jason_

Bruce had never been in Home Depot before. It was more brightly lit than most places in Gotham were, especially those he frequented as Batman, and in the general course of things, Bruce Wayne had people to do these sorts of things for him. Or, to be honest, Alfred had people who did these sorts of things before Bruce ever noticed they were necessary. But Alfred was enjoying a well-earned weekend away with Leslie, and two of the fluorescents down in the cave had burned out. Rather than rummage through the house looking for the replacements Alfred was sure to have laid in (and having to admit that he had no idea where they were kept), Bruce decided to stop in at Home Depot. How difficult could buying a few light bulbs be?

For all that it was lit up like Times Square on New Year's, the store was cavernous and bewildering. Bruce was not going to let late-stage capitalism and big box stores get the best of him, though. He wheeled his shopping cart up and down aisles stuffed with toilet seats and tiffany lamps and dozens of types of window treatments.

He was considering the merits of a new set of screwdrivers when a cart came careening around a corner and almost rammed into him. He got out of the way easily enough and then froze when the cart's owner opened his mouth to apologize and then stopped and stared.

Bruce recovered his wits first. "Jason. You look well." He did; he was tall and broad and looked like he was eating enough, and Babs kept Bruce informed as to his living conditions, so Bruce knew he currently had a roof over his head, somewhere not too far from the Clocktower.

"You, too." Jason glanced down at Bruce's cart and then up again. "Never thought I'd see _you_ here."

Bruce didn't often feel a need to explain himself to anyone, but the derision in Jason's tone nettled him. "Alfred's away." 

Jason smiled genuinely at that. "Good for him. I hope he's got Doc Thompkins there to keep him warm."

"Yes," Bruce said, disarmed. He unbent enough to smile back. "They went up to the Vineyard."

"Oh," Jason said, and Bruce remembered that he'd promised once to take Jason there for a summer vacation but it had never happened. It was just the smallest of things he'd promised to Jason, he realized, and forced himself to breathe evenly. "Sounds great."

"It's a lovely house," he said, pulling on Brucie the way he'd always tried not to with the kids. "The old house burned down in the 1880s so it was rebuilt to be quite modern for the time."

"Indoor plumbing and all mod cons?" Jason said dryly.

Bruce was startled into a real huff of laughter. "Exactly." He looked down at the set of screwdrivers in his hand and then showed them to Jason. "What do you think?"

"It's a good set for the price," Jason said, but he kept his gaze on Bruce's face. 

"Okay then." Bruce dropped them into his shopping cart, which also contained three different sets of washers he didn't need, a needle nose pliers, and a roll of duct tape too enormous to resist. 

Jason shifted, getting ready to walk away, and for once, Bruce didn't want it to end on a sour note. 

"I'm actually here to get light bulbs," he said. "Do you know what aisle they're in?"

Jason stilled and blinked, and then the tension in his body eased. He wasn't relaxed--none of them (except maybe Dick) ever managed that in public--but he wasn't bracing for a fight, either.

"Yeah," he said. "Come on."

Bruce followed him, ignoring the warm feeling in his chest.

When Alfred returned on Monday morning, he raised an eyebrow at the new tools scattered on the workbench in the cave. "You actually went to Home Depot, sir?"

"I needed light bulbs."

"And an endless supply of duct tape?"

"I ran into Jason there."

"Ah." Alfred glanced down at the pliers and the screwdrivers. "How is he doing?"

"Well," Bruce said, and was surprised to find that he meant it, and that he was pleased. "He's doing well." And perhaps he basked a little in Alfred's approval, but he'd never tell.

end

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[podfic] Parenting: A Guide By Bruce Wayne](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6358969) by [reena_jenkins](https://archiveofourown.org/users/reena_jenkins/pseuds/reena_jenkins), [victoria_p (musesfool)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/musesfool/pseuds/victoria_p)




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